Subject: CODY: THE STAND-IN, Chp.7
From: mithryl@walrus.com (Mithryl)
Date: 1997/07/30
Message-Id: <5roi95$51r@alice.walrus.com>
Newsgroups: alt.sex.bondage,rec.arts.prose,alt.sex.stories
THE STAND-IN
By Cody Ann Michaels
c. All rights reserved
Chapter 7
I noticed there was a dichotomy between Kyle and Smalhausen -- or
seemed to be. I wondered how they would get along. The one big
difference, of course, was that while Kyle was real, Smalhausen was not.
He was a figment of my imagination; a character I had made up out of bits
and pieces from the various ineffectual men who had floated through my
life. Among them were the Widow Smalhausen's son, and the man living
across the hall who was always watching me. He was an artist, and I did
pose for him onc e or twice, but there was more to the character of
Smalhausen than just that. At least, I wanted to think so. I was still
working on him. Why? I wanted him to tell me something. Something that
I couldn't get from other people, men like Kyle or Joe or even Martin.
But exactly what, I'm not sure. If I had known, there would have been no
need to invent him, would there? The problem was, once I had created
Smal, I could not go any further. I seemed to have hit a wall. I was
stumped.
Smal was not a man who liked to beat women up. But I think he
liked to think about it. He read my stories and often commented on them.
He was in his fifties. He had been sick once and walked with two canes.
He had a nice face. We became friends whe n he was attending a summer art
project in New England where I was modeling. These were like bits and
pieces of information that I pulled out of my grabbag of notes to put him
together, sort of like Scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz. I'm trying to
remember what Scarecrow needed? A heart? A brain? Guts? No. That was
the lion. A dick? Balls? I never slept with him, so I don't know.
Smalhausen needed legs. He could walk, but not very well. He was
incredibly slow.
Not that being crippled is so bad, but he also complained
endlessly. Chiefly about not having a woman. And not wanting one because
he was so old and tired and slow he couldn't keep up with one if he had
her. You can see how boring he was.
But then, that's the way I had made him. A boring Frankenstein.
Maybe from his own point of view, he wasn't so bad. I wondered.
You see, I didn't know how to go any further. In the past, I'd
relied on guys who beat me up or trashed me in different ways. Guys and
chicks like Kelly. Dealing with someone who treated me okay was a
different ball game. Not that Smalhausen didn't h ave ideas. Or his
hands were clean. You should have seen the pictures. Like my worst
nightmare. Well, no. He wasn't that good. But you could see what he was
groping for. He just didn't know how to do it. He had pictures of guys
hitting chicks. Bu t they weren't very believable. Not like Stanton or
Eneg, the artists from the fifties who he admired. He had tons of their
work. On the other hand, they, his pictures, had their own brand of
grittiness. There was something brutal and clumsy about the way he
portrayed a girl face down in the mud, her hands wired behind her back.
Red dress torn and hiked up over her big ass cheeks. Some trees and a
house in the distance. One was called, "After the Prom." Another girl in
a woodshed. His vistas were lonely, out of the way places. The girl was
usually alone, although she seemed to be looking at someone just out of
the picture, with fear or anger. Or disgust. Someone who might be
dangerous. The girls on their bellies weren't looking. Their faces were
often turned away. He called these pictures his "Death of Soul"
paintings, as if that somehow justified them.
He said the woman was the woman inside himself. That they were
self portraits. All men, he said, have a woman they carry around inside
themselves. The other half of their genes, that don't get manifested.
They...
He talked bullshit. I didn't understand most of it. I figured
the pictures were his way of playing with himself. Some men look at
Playboy. Smalhausen was making his own home brew.
That's all he drew. Women. Usually in some kind of distress.
And masks. He would sometimes draw or paint animal masks. Then he said
he could not feel the woman within and he was trying to get in touch with
her. She had left him, as if she were a re al person, someone who had a
separate life of her own. He had a lot of these middle class,
intellectual bullshit ideas about native myths and spiritual practices.
The Indians, he said, had called the woman Changing Woman and Spider
Grandmother. But his women never changed. He never drew old women
either. Just young, pretty redheads. Like me. He was nuts about
redheads. I wondered if I was a blonde would he even talk to me?
Although he had another friend, Teresa, who was a blonde. He told her all
the same bullshit. I wonder if even he believed it.
Personally, I think he was trying to compensate for being
crippled. And alone. So he invented a world of redheaded women. Just
like I invented him. I wondered if they talked to him. Or did he talk to
them? I mean, he wouldn't have to explain to his women what they were,
the other half of himself, etc., that bullshit. Because they would
already know, wouldn't they? What would he say to them when he was
putting one on a dildo pole? Impaling her? Drawing cuts and bruises on
her pink skin? Making a line and a purple smudge when her eye had been
blackened shut? If he made them, did he have to explain? Most of the
guys who beat me up never said why. I don't think they gave a damn what I
thought.
One day while Smal was drawing me, Teresa told him about a video
she had rented about three girls who get back at the guy who raped a
friend of theirs and made her suicide. He didn't seem interested. They
had smashed his new car and written "rapist" al l over it, scratching it
in the paint. Then they did something to another evil guy, and something
to someone else. Teresa wanted me to see it.
Yeah, I thought, that would make a good movie, but then the girls
would get caught, and you know what would happen then. Yeah. This really
is a world where women get beat up a lot. And you know what kind of
motive wrecking some guy's Cadallac would be to a guy? Oh God. I could
just see it. Feel it. I don't want to think.
To be truthful, I don't want to think, tonight at all. Someone
was here for a session this afternoon, and I'm not feeling so good. I
wanted to write something though. Now I don't know what.
Too hot. Got a fever.
Maybe later.
Some guy who's old lady wrecked his car. Her and her friends.
Stinking bitches. If they'd fixed him any more, I wouldn't be able to
walk. What'd he have to take it out on me for? Story idea. Work on it.
Now I have to write another story. I got another letter from this
guy in Cleveland, the one I wrote about in my column:
"OK, no one ever accused CODY of being coy.
Your fame is a twisted one. One of your
stories was used in a Political Analysis
Senior Seminar. It was supposed to be a
Bad Example of how Political thought can
get distorted.
"Your other major claim to fame is a vicious
rumor that you really do like a good whipping.
So some of your stories were analyzed doing
a Noam Chomsky word frequency anaylsis to see
if your stories supported the rumors.
"This is all weird stuff, totally out of your
control and I hope it does not adversely affect
your continuing to write the best, most independent
minded sex stories on the net."
*
I promise it won't affect me; I'll still be the same innoncent,
unaffected waif men know and love. But it did give me an idea:
Good morning students. This morning we have a special treat. As
you know, in the past weeks, we have been studying the writings of the
Nobel laureate, Cody Ann Michaels. Today, she has consented to be with us
in person and make herself available for y our questions. Ms. Michaels,
or shall we call you, Cody?
"Thank you, Professor. Cody will be fine."
Whatever the students of Twisted Logic 101 expected America's
teenage sex queen to look like, the tall young woman who stepped to the
rostrum did not exactly fit the specifications.
Dressed impeccably in a navy blue unfitted Prada suit that gave
little indication of the body beneath, her red hair was pulled back in a
severe bun. She could have been any of the fifteen year old female
professors and research assistants who populated the large university.
Cody was already famous as the first internet writer to win the Nobel
prize, largely on the strength of her autobiographical novel, MY STRUGGLE,
which had been a runaway best seller in Germany, taking the Plume de
Pilsner at the Mun ich Book Fair, before it was suppressed for various
political reasons, making her a cause de celebre among literatti
elsewhere. Musollini's granddaughter had embraced her. Cody was non
plussed. Lot's of women came onto her.
Anyway, she was now struggling to redeem her life, by dressing
down, and trying to be relevant. The modestly dressed young woman who
faced the class this morning gave no sign or indication that she had once
been a notorious, leather clad street tart and pain sex addict. Except
for a few wisps of hair that had come loose and fell over her forehead,
she was totally in control. Aren't you, Cody?
The skirt was also a little short. And slit up the side. But as
she was standing in front of the podium, rather, in back of it, behind it,
no one could notice. Except the Prof, who she was aware kept looking at
her. They had met at a party. At Smalh ausen's. In Smalhausen's studio.
He had said how he used her book in his class. Or something. That she
wrote. She forgot which. Maybe he hadn't said. Her hands shook as she
held the papers for her lecture. Would she like to speak to his class?
Hi. She said. A bit nervous. All those faces. Staring at her.
What was she going to talk about? Being a writer. How hard it was. In
the 90s. What her ideals were? The 21st Century. Looking ahead. Making
a better world. Violence against women . The economy. Were there any
questions?
One kid raised his hand. Yes? Is it true you really like to get
your ass whipped?
Oh God. They all ask that. She pushed the hair out of her face.
The movement seemed to dislodge more. She put her hand back to adjust the
bun. Touching it. The movement raised her jacket. They saw the sheer
she had on underneath. The tiny bra. She said no.
Another girl raised her hand. Have you ever been beaten up?
Yes.
Is it true your father raped you?
Yes.
Why didn't you report him?
I was afraid. He was running for....
What about your brother?
She started to walk back and forth. The skirt split almost to the
waist. She came around and sat on the edge of the table. The jacket hung
open. Her skirt slid up, showing off the bare skin above the black sheer
stockings. They wanted to know everything. She was sweating.
Unconsciously, she slipped off the jacket, revealing the sheer grey nylon
dickey underneath. Her breasts were as big as she had said they were in
the book. Under the skirt, she was wearing black panties.
She began to feel like a laboratory animal. Someone to stick pins
in. See what happened. They weren't going to be happy until she
completely undressed and stood there naked, were they? In front of them.
One of her eyes had a bruise under it. Did people still hurt you?
Yes.
When?
Last night.
Why?
I deserved it.
What did you do?
Wrecked his car.
Why?
My girl friend suicided when he raped her.
Kelly?
No. Someone else. We were role playing.
He needed to get his rocks off. The gross injustice. His white
cadillac. WHAM. Cinderblocks through the windshield. WHAM. Rapist
scratched into the paint job. He wrote it across her tits. They looked
at the incissions. That's terrible, a girl sa id. Boy, they had never
seen anything like that. She showed them her belly. She had dropped the
skirt. All she had on now were garterbelt and panties. He had ripped her
belly apart. Her hair was bloody.
aaaaaaggghgg
Her hair had come completely loose by now, and fell in her face.
She slid down on her knees. And crawled towards the door. They watched
her leave. Boy, that was some demonstration. Someone, the class
assistant, picked up her clothes and threw them out in the hallway after
her.
That wasn't the end of it, of course. He kept coming back.
Hitting her again and again. Eventually, she couldn't take any more. She
just stopped thinking. No matter what she did, she always ended up in the
same place. Why is that, Smalhausen? He s aid he didn't know. He could
explain his interest in women, but he couldn't figure out her propensity
for getting beat up. To him, it seemed a waste of time. But at the same
time, he loved to hear about it. He was another one of those I feel your
pain freaks. Although she rather doubted he could.
She was covered with sweat and filth when she crawled into his
studio. Those kids had done a number on her. The future of America was
really safe in their hands. Now she had to pose. He stood her on a pole,
with her hands behind her back. Then he st arted to draw. A rope around
her neck kept her from slouching.
I think Smalhausen is confused about his sexual life. That's why
he likes to draw me in bondage. I represent his tied up sexual energy.
The students had asked me about my sexual preferences. They were a keenly
interested bunch of inquiring minds. I almost felt overwhelmed.
Gradually, they took me apart. Probing. Groping. Tearing at my clothes.
I struggled as much as I could, but there were too many.
Not that he ever sells any of these pictures. They're too artsy
for the hard core line. Not enough detail. His eyes look like smudges.
And lace garter belts? Forget it. Just some crude lines.
THE WAR CRIMINAL
(excerpt from a work in progress)
Years ago, Smalhausen said, I was on a train, going down to
Florida, to visit my mom. It was just after my dad died. I used to take
the train, because I don't like to fly. But now it has become too much to
bear. At some point, Philadelphia or Baltimo re, a woman got on. Who was
assigned the seat next to me. I ought to explain. It used to be my
practice whenever the train stopped, to lie down across both seats and
pretend to be sleeping. Unless the train was jammed, people would usually
hesitate to wake me and sit somewhere else. Sometimes I was able to get a
double wide all the way to Florida. However, the Amtrak people had got
wise and all seats out of New York were now being assigned. This woman
had drawn me.
At first, she was not too happy about it. In fact, she asked the
conductor if there wasn't another double seat somewhere. But when he said
there were only singles, she gave up and sat down. She was not
unattractive. Young. Fleshy. I knew insta ntly she was Jewish.
Ordinarily, I don't like to get involved with Jewish women. Not that I'm
so anti-semitic, but ultimately they are all linked back to Israel and all
the bullshit hypocracy that entails. This woman, however, turned out to
be quite pe rsonable. In fact, we talked until four in the morning.
Slept for a few hours. Had breakfast. Then sat in the club car and
talked until Sebring. Well, no. We also spent a lot of time together in
our seats. We became very intimate. The time went by very fast. It was
most enjoyable trip I ever made to Florida. She had been raised
conservative, very strict, but no longer practiced her religion, except
when her parents came to visit. Then she made her Italian boy friend wear
a yamaka. She also had another goy boy friend, and was trying to decided
which one to stay with. I was, myself, very much drawn to this woman.
However, when we kissed goodbye at my stop and I got off, I deliberately
did not ask for her telephone number or address, something I instantly
regreted as I stood watching the train disappear.
It is just daylight when the Meteor or Crescent, I forget which,
gets to Jacksonville. But it does not reach south Florida until five p.m.
That gave us a lot to time to talk there in the club car as the small
stops on the Georgia line rolled past. We watched the cars of the Georgia
Pacific as they rolled past our window. There were other names, which I
have forgotten. Kissimeee. Burnt Oaks. Ravenwood. Erie Lakawanna.
CNN. We played games. Seeing who could name the most. But all the
while, som ething hovered in the background if you know what I mean? She
looked at me through her chubby Jewish flesh covered with rings. She was
a jeweler. I could tell she was class. In the night, she was warm
against me. Filling the folds of my hollows. She nicked me in. Where
are you going? Boca. So am I. Somehow I got off at the wrong stop.
Where was I?
Her name was Ronda. Or Rhoda. What else? She just seemed very
nice. But something hovered in the background, if you know what I mean?
Which was, I was a war criminal. I didn't tell her. She knew. Why do
you think she backed off. There's a Nazi i n my seat. Tell him to move
over. I had to get up and give her the seat. I still pretended to be
sleeping. She went away and had supper and came back and made noises.
Putting on makeup. At 10 o'clock at night. Eventually, I gave up and
started to t alk to her. Of course, I wasn't a war criminal, but I
thought like one. So what's the difference? I was wearing an armband.
The star of Hitler. But she didn't notice. She just started talking.
I'm a good listener. She was very exciting. We flirte d all the way to
Decatur. Then I fell asleep. And so did she.
It's not like I felt bad about the war or anything. I was five
when it ended. It just sort of lingered there between us. Even when we
were fucking. It wasn't much. She just had a big sexual appetite. I was
impressed. It turned out she liked Nazis. We just had to learn to get
along. And besides I was getting off at Delray. So what's the big deal?
Of course, I'm not a Nazi, but we were role playing. Soon the entire club
car was filled with German drinking songs. I felt suffused with fuerher
fe ver. It's common on the long lines. Snaking all the way to Baltimore
and ... no and, schazi. unt. Ya wohl. Mein heirrn und mein damen life
is a cabaret, old chum. Come smell the wine. Some drink the tunes. Some
get up and goose-step to Atlanta. Th en we get off the train and there's
nothing left. Her's, of course, was a different experience.
The thing is, he said, we are suffused with this war time
mystique. It divides us. Even though I was not a war criminal, I could
have been. Or the son of one. Someone who carries the collective guilt
of those who are guilty. I thought it might be fl eshed out into a novel.
But I never did. At one point, she explained to me the differences in
diamonds. I had asked her about mine cut stones. This is the way
diamonds were cut before 1919. A great uncle of mine had a ring with a
mine cut stone. But then new ways were found. A diamond's brilliance
depends on how it is cut. Mine cut diamonds are not as sparkly as similar
stones cut in the more modern ways, don't ask me to explain. Most of it
was beyond me. However, wasn't that a metaphor for some thing? Like the
way a story is cut and polished. Edited. To reveal its inner truth. Or
a life. Or a work of art. All the time he was painting me. I couldn't
move. What did he want from me? Meaning? For his sad, empty life? I
couldn't muster it. I was too tired. Just get done, I thought. I want
to go home.
*
Compared to the students, Smalhausen's mind seemed dull and slow.
His apartment, which is also his studio, was littered with junk his mother
sent him. Bags of pills. Instant soup mixes. Different cold remedies.
Stuff he never uses. I asked him why he kept it? He said he once read a
story about Leonardo da Vinci. He had been born on the wrong side of the
sheet, so to speak. His mother was a serving girl, almost a slave. The
people she worked for took him in and raised him. But he had almost no
contact with his mother. However, towards the end of her life, she made a
long journey to visit him, all the way from their little town south of
Florence, to Milan where he was living. They were almost strangers. She
brought him a gift of shirts, sever al, that she had made. But they were
too small. They didn't fit. Even though he couldn't wear them, Leonardo
kept them for the rest of his life. That story affected me deeply. My
mother doesn't know me either. But she keeps sending me things that do
n't fit. That have nothing to do with my life. But I can't bear to throw
them out. Sometimes, something turns out to be useful.
I have to admit, I lifted this conversation from one I overheard
in a restaurant. And the one about the train I've had knocking around for
some time. They just seem to define the person of Smalhausen. The name
itself is from a character in an English tv sitcom. Maybe you've seen it.
Smalhausen is a Gestapo agent, but not even the top Gestapo agent. He's
the hopelessly inept underling to an inept chief. Sort of like Igor in
Frankenstein movies. I needed a name for this person. That seemed to be
it.
I suppose you might ask, why am I bothering? The thing is, I want
to be relevant, and it is necessary to study these matters seriously.
Smalhausen is a man of our times. He seems to be deeply confused. But is
he? He's making out alright. He could b e worse. He's so boring. Or is
he? Some people like that. You need to get out more. You should take
Teresa up on that ride. You might have fun. We might have an accident.
Smal, you've got to change your ways of living, and if that ain't enough,
yo u've got to change the way you strut your stuff. Parties at Smal's
tended to be tedious affairs but afterwards, you wake up and it's all
over.
Go to sleep.
It doesn't matter.
I'll be here.
You weren't when I was in the hospital.
So I was out of town.
I called you.
You never answered.
Teresa took care of you.
I needed you. It was you I need.
Why don't you all go down together.
A suicide pact between mom and son.
A cult.
A happening.
It's all here in the papers.
The funny papers.
Smal's mother never has the funny papers read. That's what she says when
she calls. I haven't had time to read the funny papers. He makes notes
on a pad. He draws figures. He draws pictures of me while he talks to
his ma. I dance in front of him while the old lady sings about her air
conditioner and her eyes. She's going blind. She feels her way around
the trailer park with her hands. The widow Smalhausen is a composite of
lots of old ladies down there. Orphan moms calling to their sons. He
draws the handcuffs and the ribbon wire. and the noose around my neck.
Maybe what I'm using Smal to find out is why men have this need to beat up
women. It can't all be because of their mothers, can it? He's sort of
like a microscope that I've concocted to do deep see exploration if you
know what I mean.
Now are there any questions?